Duffy braced for some big Congleton challenges as campaign gets underway

FOOTBALL: Congleton Town head into their Northern Premier League West Division season today with boss Richard Duffy maintaining, “it's a tough one to gauge.” A trip to Sporting Khalsa awaits his side in the opener as The Bears look to replicate last season when, in their first outing at Step 4, they finished a magnificent third before losing to big-spending Hednesford Town in the play-off final.

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A rarity is staying in the same league two seasons running either due to geographical switches or promotion and Duffy told the club: “We are looking forward to it.

“Obviously with the way last season ended, the disappointment, the lads look bright and fresh in training and showed in games they are ready to have another competitive season.

“It's a tough one to gauge. This one is going to be totally different. Lots of teams are bringing players in and spending money that some teams can't compete with.

“It's going to be really tough. Bury are coming up and they will be favourites no doubt. Then you are going to have a bunch of 10 or 12 teams who fancy themselves to have a really good go at the playoffs.”

He added: "As we know only four can get in there amongst the top five.

“Our ambition is to get as many points on the board as quickly as we can like last year and however long that takes us we can reassess from there.”